The Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC) has revealed that its decision to pay ₦100,000 weekly to people quarantined over possible exposure to Ebola was an unplanned, temporary measure introduced on compassionate grounds after some threatened to leave the facilities.

The NCDC Director-General, Jide Idris, disclosed this on Monday during an appearance on Channels Television’s Politics Today, explaining that the agency introduced the payments to address concerns raised by quarantined contacts who said their absence from home was affecting their families and businesses.

Mr Idris said the authorities had taken affected people out of their normal environments for public health reasons, making it necessary to consider their welfare while ensuring they complied with quarantine measures.

“Those people who were in the quarantine area, there are people who never planned to be there. We took them out of their comfort zones to put them there for public health reasons,” he said.

Mr Idris said the agency had taken responsibility for their feeding and accommodation but faced complaints from some quarantined contacts who said they had families to support and businesses to run.

He said some threatened to leave the facilities because of the disruption to their daily lives, a development he described as a potential public health concern.

“If you allow them to leave the place, it’s a public health issue because you don’t know whether they will turn positive or who is ill,” he said.

Mr Idris explained that the financial support was introduced to ease tensions and encourage affected people to remain in quarantine for the period health authorities require.

He said the arrangement was temporary and had not been part of the agency’s original budget.

“It’s a temporary thing because it’s not something we’ve done,” he said, adding that the government had to intervene because the expected support from state governments was not forthcoming.

State governments’ responsibilities

Mr Idris said state governments were responsible for providing quarantine facilities and the resources needed to manage people placed under public health restrictions.

He said the NCDC stepped in to address the immediate welfare concerns of the quarantined contacts because the necessary support had not been provided.

The agency’s intervention, he explained, was intended to prevent people from leaving designated facilities before completing the required monitoring period.

Nigeria’s Ebola response

PREMIUM TIMES earlier reported that the NCDC approved a weekly allowance of N100,000 for each person quarantined following possible exposure to Nigeria’s confirmed Ebola patient in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).

Speaking on Channels Television on Monday, Mr Idris said the number of identified contacts had increased to 54 after authorities traced an Uber driver who transported the patient to the first hospital where she sought treatment.

The contacts include healthcare workers, the patient’s husband, domestic staff and personnel involved in collecting samples.

They are being monitored for 21 days after their last possible exposure, in line with Ebola’s incubation period.

Nigeria confirmed the imported Ebola case on 20 October, its first since the 2014 outbreak. The patient, a 42-year-old Ugandan-born woman living in Abuja, was subsequently evacuated to Switzerland alongside her husband.

The woman is receiving treatment in Geneva, while her husband, who had shown no symptoms, remains in isolation in Zurich.

Following their evacuation, the World Health Organisation said Nigeria had no remaining confirmed Ebola cases, noting that contact monitoring and other public health measures continue.